Film Details

The Little Fugitive

United States | 1953 | Ray Ashley, Morris Engel, Ruth Orkin

60th Anniversary

New 35mm Restoration!

A seven-year-old Brooklyn boy is tricked into believing that he has killed his older brother. So he runs away to Coney Island and spends a day among the rides, games, and attractions there. This landmark American independent film, shot with non-professional actors in real locations, inspired countless aspiring filmmakers. "Five stars (highest rating)…There's influential, and then there's this 1953 microbudgeted beauty that's made its way into the DNA of everything from cinema vérité to the French New Wave." –Time Out New York. Cleveland revival premiere.

80 min. An Artists Public Domain/Cinema Conservancy Release. Preserved by The Museum of Modern Art with support from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Film Foundation and The Celeste Bartos Film Preservation Fund. Photo courtesy Orkin/Engel Film & Photo Archive/APD/Cinema Conservancy.